Iowa Petroleum Underground Storage Tank Board, State of Iowa, Independent Auditor's Reports, Financial Statements and Supplementary Information, June 30, 2004

State Audit Reports

Concrete Materials Storage, Mixing and Delivery, November 2004

Proper storage practices are critical to protect materials from intermingling, contamination, or degradation, and to maintain consistent aggregate gradation throughout a project. Concrete Paving Workforce Reference no.1

Caution on the storage of waters and aqueous solutions in plastic containers for hydrogen and oxygen stable isotope analysis

RATIONALE The choice of containers for storage of aqueous samples between their collection, transport and water hydrogen (2H) and oxygen (18O) stable isotope analysis is a topic of concern for a wide range of fields in environmental, geological, biomedical, food, and forensic sciences. The transport and separation of water molecules during water vapor or liquid uptake by sorption or solution and the diffusive transport of water molecules through organic polymer material by permeation or pervaporation may entail an isotopic fractionation. An experiment was conducted to evaluate the extent of such fractionation. METHODS Sixteen bottle-like containers of eleven different organic polymers, including low and high density polyethylene (LDPE and HDPE), polypropylene (PP), polycarbonate (PC), polyethylene terephthalate (PET), and perfluoroalkoxy-Teflon (PFA), of different wall thickness and size were completely filled with the same mineral water and stored for 659?days under the same conditions of temperature and humidity. Particular care was exercised to keep the bottles tightly closed and prevent loss of water vapor through the seals. RESULTS Changes of up to +5 parts per thousand for d2H values and +2.0 parts per thousand for d18O values were measured for water after more than 1?year of storage within a plastic container, with the magnitude of change depending mainly on the type of organic polymer, wall thickness, and container size. The most important variations were measured for the PET and PC bottles. Waters stored in glass bottles with Polyseal (TM) cone-lined PP screw caps and thick-walled HDPE or PFA containers with linerless screw caps having an integrally molded inner sealing ring preserved their original d2H and d18O values. The carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen stable isotope compositions of the organic polymeric materials were also determined. CONCLUSIONS The results of this study clearly show that for precise and accurate measurements of the water stable isotope composition in aqueous solutions, rigorous sampling and storage procedures are needed both for laboratory standards and for unknown samples. Copyright (c) 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Iowa Petroleum Underground Storage Tank Board, State of Iowa, Independent Auditor's Reports, Basic Financial Statements and Supplementary Information, Schedule of Findings, June 30, 2005

State Audit Reports

Audit report on the Iowa Petroleum Underground Storage Tank Board (UST Board) for the year ended June 30, 2006

Audit report on the Iowa Petroleum Underground Storage Tank Board (UST Board) for the year ended June 30, 2006

On money as a medium of exchange when goods vary by supply and demand

Models of the exchange process based on search theory can be usedto analyze the features of objects that make them more or less likely toemerge as ``money'' in equilibrium. These models illustrate the trade--offbetween endogenous acceptability (an equilibrium property) and intrinsiccharacteristics of goods, such as storability, recognizability, etc. Inthis paper, we look at how the relative supply and demand for various goodsaffect their likelihood of becoming money. Intuitively, goods in highdemand and/or low supply are more likely to appear as commodity money,subject to the qualification that which object ends up circulating as amedium of exchange depends at least partly on convention. Welfare propertiesare discussed.

Secreted glutamic protease rescues aspartic protease Pep deficiency in Aspergillus fumigatus during growth in acidic protein medium.

In an acidic protein medium Aspergillus fumigatus secretes an aspartic endoprotease (Pep) as well as tripeptidyl-peptidases, a prolyl-peptidase and carboxypeptidases. In addition, LC-MS/MS revealed a novel glutamic protease, AfuGprA, homologous to Aspergillus niger aspergillopepsin II. The importance of AfuGprA in protein digestion was evaluated by deletion of its encoding gene in A. fumigatus wild-type D141 and in a pepΔ mutant. Either A. fumigatus Pep or AfuGprA was shown to be necessary for fungal growth in protein medium at low pH. Exoproteolytic activity is therefore not sufficient for complete protein hydrolysis and fungal growth in a medium containing proteins as the sole nitrogen source. Pep and AfuGprA constitute a pair of endoproteases active at low pH, in analogy to A. fumigatus alkaline protease (Alp) and metalloprotease I (Mep), where at least one of these enzymes is necessary for fungal growth in protein medium at neutral pH. Heterologous expression of AfuGprA in Pichia pastoris showed that the enzyme is synthesized as a preproprotein and that the propeptide is removed through an autoproteolytic reaction at low pH to generate the mature protease. In contrast to A. niger aspergillopepsin II, AfuGprA is a single-chain protein and is structurally more similar to G1 proteases characterized in other non-Aspergillus fungi.

Rearing method of Oryzaephilus surinamensis (L.) (Coleoptera, Silvanidae) on various wheat grain granulometry

Oryzaephilus surinamensis is one of most common insect pest of grains and a variety of stored products, and has been found in high numbers in almost all storage facilities. However, laboratory mass rearing of this insect for bioassays is not a simple task, mainly because of its feeding behavior, small size, and high mobility. Thus, the aim of this work was to develop a simple and efficient laboratory rearing method for O. surinamensis, using wheat kernels milled into different granulometry to obtain large number and standardized population at different life stages for bioassays. The adults were collected from storage grain facilities in the southern region of Brazil and 100 specimens were placed inside glass jars with wheat kernels milled at different grades and kept at 25±0.5ºC and 65±5% relative humidity. The insects were allowed to copulate and lay eggs for 10 days and then removed. The number of eggs, larvae, and pupae was counted at five-day intervals; longevity of the second generation adults was evaluated. The kernels milled at grade 20 were the best medium for offspring production: 89% of eggs by the 5th day; 30.5% larvae by the 10th day; 43% pupae by the 30th day and 63.4% adults at the 46th day. The adults survived up to 450 days. Culturing O. surinamensis under the described conditions, transferring the parental adults by the 10th day after infestation and replacing the media when population builds up will produce enough insects of each stage for various laboratory bioassays.

Molecular determinants of vesicular storage and release of the gliotransmitter D-serine from cortical astrocytes

Neuron-astrocyte reciprocal communication at synapses has emerged as a novel signalling pathway in brain function. Astrocytes sense the level of synaptic activity and, in turn, influence its efficacy through the regulated release of 'gliotransmitters' such as glutamate, ATP or D-serine. A calcium-dependent exocytosis is proposed to drive the release of gliotransmitters but its existence is still debated. Over the last years, we have been studying the molecular determinants governing D-serine release from glia using different approaches. Using a novel bioassay for D-serine, we have been able to show that D-serine release occurs mainly through a calcium- and SNARE proteindependent mechanism just supporting the idea that this amino acid is released by exocytosis from glia. We next have pursued our exploration by confocal imaging and tracking of the exocytotic routes for Dserine- mediated gliotransmission and have shown that D-serine releasable pools are confined to synaptobrevin2/cellubrevin-bearing vesicles. To shed light onto the mechanisms controlling the storage and the release of gliotransmitters and namely D-serine, we have developed a new method for the immunoisolation of synaptobrevin 2- positive vesicles from rat cortical astrocytes in culture while preserving their content in gliotransmitters. The purified organelles are clear round shape vesicles of excellent purity with homogeneous size (40 nm) as judged by electron microscopy. Immunoblotting analysis revealed that isolated vesicles contain most of the major proteins already described for neuron-derived vesicles like synaptic vesicle protein 2 (SV2) and the proton pump H?-ATPase. In addition, we have analyzed the content for various amino acids of these vesicles by means of chiral capillary electrophoresis coupled to laser-induced fluorescence detection. The purified vesicles contain large amount of D-serine. We also detect peaks corresponding to unidentified compounds that may correspond to others amino acids. Postembedding immunogold labelling of the rat neocortex further revealed the expression of D-serine in astrocytes processes contacting excitatory synapses. Finally, we have examined the uptake properties for Dserine and glutamate inside the isolated glial vesicles. Our results provide significant support for the existence of an uptake system for D-serine in secretory glial vesicles and for the storage of chemical substances like D-serine and glutamate. 11th International Congress on Amino Acids, Peptides and Proteins 763 123

Audit report on the Iowa Petroleum Underground Storage Tank Board (UST Board) for the year ended June 30, 2007

Audit report on the Iowa Petroleum Underground Storage Tank Board (UST Board) for the year ended June 30, 2007

On moments and tail behaviors of storage processes

We study the existence of moments and the tail behaviour of the densitiesof storage processes. We give sufficient conditions for existence andnon-existence of moments using the integrability conditions ofsubmultiplicative functions with respect to Lévy measures. Then, we studythe asymptotical behavior of the tails of these processes using the concaveor convex envelope of the release rate function.

Pattern of attack of a galling insect reveals an unexpected preference-performance linkage on medium-sized resources

Pattern of attack of a galling insect reveals an unexpected preference-performance linkage on medium-sized resources. The Plant Vigor Hypothesis (PVH) predicts oviposition preference and higher offspring performance on longer and fast-growing shoots, and although several studies have tested its predictions, long-term studies concerning the patterns of host selection by galling species are still lacking. The PVH was tested in this study using Bauhinia brevipes (Fabaceae) as the host of a leaf gall midge, Asphondylia microcapillata (Diptera, Cecidomyiidae) during three consecutive years. Shoots were collected from the same 80 plants between 2001 and 2003 and shoot length, number of healthy and galled leaves, gall number, and mortality factors were recorded. Nearly 600 galls were found on the 5,800 shoots collected. Medium-sized shoots supported from 46 to 70% of all galls, with greater gall survival rate in 2002 and 2003. A decrease in parasitism rate coupled with an increase in gall predation lead to a constant similar gall survivorship rate in all years (x = 22.7%). Although gall abundance varied among years (122 in 2001, 114 in 2002 and 359 in 2003) preference for longer shoots was not observed because the percentage of galled shoots and galled leaves were higher on medium shoot length classes in all years. The observed distribution of gall abundance and galled shoots were always greater than the expected distribution on medium shoot length classes. These findings do not support the PVH, and show that A. microcapillata can maximize the female preference and larval performance on medium-sized shoots of B. brevipes.

A medium-scale open economy model of Australia

We estimate an open economy dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE)model of Australia with a number of shocks, frictions and rigidities, matching alarge number of observable time series. We find that both foreign and domesticshocks are important drivers of the Australian business cycle.We also find that theinitial impact on inflation of an increase in demand for Australian commoditiesis negative, due to an improvement in the real exchange rate, though there is apersistent positive effect on inflation that dominates at longer horizons.